About a year ago I stopped making regular updates to this blog to concentrate on my Namnesia Antidote blog. While that is an ongoing effort, I am starting what should be about a year long effort to revitalize the concept of a "This Day in History" blog. I have decided to leave this blog intact and as-is, using a new "This Day in History 2.0" blog for my expanded and full version. Please feel free to email with your ideas. The two tables below should allow you to find a posting for the "Day in History" you wish to research.

Saturday, October 21, 2006

October 21......

October 21 is the 294th day of the year (295th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 71 days remaining in the year on this date.

EVENTS

● 686 - Conon becomes Pope.

● 1512 - Martin Luther joins the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg

● 1600 - Tokugawa Ieyasu defeats the leaders of rival Japanese clans in the Battle of Sekigahara, which marks the beginning of the Tokugawa shogunate, who in effect rule Japan until the mid-Nineteenth century.

● 1774 - First display of the word "Liberty" on a flag, raised by colonists in Taunton, Massachusetts and which was in defiance of British rule in Colonial America.

● 1797 - In Boston Harbor, the 44-gun United States Navy frigate USS Constitution, also known as Old Ironsides, is launched.

● 1805 - Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Trafalgar - a British fleet led by Admiral Lord Nelson defeats a combined French and Spanish fleet off the coast of Spain under Admiral Villeneuve. It signaled the virtual end of French maritime power and left Britain navally unchallenged until the twentieth century. Nelson, however, was killed.

● 1805 - Napoleonic Wars: Austrian General Mack surrenders his army to the Grand Army of Napoleon at Ulm, reaping Napoleon over 30,000 prisoners and inflicting 10,000 casualties on the losers. Ulm was considered to be one of Napoleon's finest hours.

● 1824 - Joseph Aspdin patents Portland cement.

● 1854 - Florence Nightingale and a staff of 38 nurses were sent to the Crimean War.

● 1861 - American Civil War: Battle of Ball's Bluff - Union forces under Colonel Edward Baker are defeated by Confederate troops in the second major battle of the war. Baker, a close friend of Abraham Lincoln, is killed in the fighting.

● 1867 - Manifest Destiny: Medicine Lodge Treaty - Near Medicine Lodge, Kansas a landmark treaty is signed by southern Great Plains Indian leaders. The treaty requires Native American Plains tribes to relocate a reservation in western Oklahoma.

● 1967 - Vietnam War: More than 100,000 war protesters gather in Washington, DC. A peaceful rally at the Lincoln Memorial is followed by a march to The Pentagon and clashes with soldiers and United States Marshals protecting the facility (event lasts until October 23; 683 people were arrested). Similar demonstrations occurred simultaneously in Japan and Western Europe.

● 1969 - A coup d'état in Somalia brings Siad Barre to power.

● 1971 - President Richard M. Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.

● 1973 - John Paul Getty III's ear is cut off by his kidnappers and sent to a newspaper in Rome; it doesn't arrive until November 8.

● 1975 - Herrema kidnappers under siege; Armed police are surrounding a house near Dublin where kidnapped businessman Tiede Herrema is being held captive.

● 1975 - Boston Red Sox catcher Carlton Fisk hit a ball that struck the left field foul pole in Boston's Fenway Park for a home run, giving the Red Sox a 7-6 victory in 12 innings over the Cincinnati Reds in Game 6 of the World Series.

● 1976 - Keith Moon plays his last public show with The Who. He died in 1978.

● 1977 - The European Patent Institute is founded

● 1977 - Meat Loaf's hit album Bat Out of Hell is released under Epic's Cleveland International Records

● 1978 - Australian civilian pilot Frederick Valentich vanishes in a Cessna 182 over the Bass Strait south of Melbourne, after reporting contact with an unidentified aircraft.

● 1982 - Sinn Fein triumph in elections; Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness make history as they become the first members of Sinn Fein to be elected to the Ulster Assembly.

● 1983 - The metre is defined at the seventeenth General Conference on Weights and Measures in terms of the speed of light as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

● 1986 - In Lebanon, pro-Iranian kidnappers claim to have abducted American writer Edward Tracy (he was released in August 1991).

● 1987 - Former Miss America Bess Myerson is arrested on charges of bribery, conspiracy, and mail fraud, all involving an alimony-fixing scandal. She is later found not guilty.

● 1988 - A federal grand jury in New York indicted former Philippine President Ferdinand E. Marcos and his wife, Imelda, on charges of fraud and racketeering.

● 1994 - North Korea nuclear weapons program: North Korea and the United States sign an agreement that requires North Korea to stop its nuclear weapons program and agree to inspections.

● 1904 - Isabelle Eberhardt, explorer and writer who spent a lot of time in North Africa (b. 1877)

● 1931 - Arthur Schnitzler, Austrian writer (b. 1862)

● 1944 - Alois Kayser, German missionary to Nauru (b. 1877)

● 1969 - Jack Kerouac, American novelist (b. 1922)

● 1969 - Waclaw Sierpinski, Polish mathematician (b. 1882)

● 1975 - Charles Reidpath, American athlete (b. 1887)

● 1980 - Hans Asperger, Austrian psychologist (b. 1906)

● 1984 - François Truffaut, French film director (b. 1932)

● 1986 - Lionel Murphy, Australian politician and judge (b. 1922)

● 1995 - Shannon Hoon, American singer (Blind Melon) (b. 1967)

● 1995 - Jesús Blasco, Spanish comic book author (b. 1919)

● 2003 - Fred Berry, American actor (b. 1951)

● 2003 - Luis A. Ferré, Governor of Puerto Rico (b. 1940)

● 2003 - Louise Day Hicks, American politician (b. 1916)

● 2003 - Elliott Smith, American musician (b. 1969)

HOLIDAYS AND OBSERVANCES

● Roman Catholic Saints● Saint Ursula● Saint Hilarion● Saint Leticia

● Republic of China - Overseas Chinese Day

● Trafalgar Day — celebrated throughout much of the British Empire in the 19th and early 20th Century.

● Diwali in Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism, and Buddhism (2006)

● French Republican Calendar - Tonneau (Barrel) Day, thirtieth day in the Month of Vendémiaire

● Sweetest Day - Celebrated mostly in the Midwest United States (2006)

IN FICTION

● In the comic novel Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, the Earth was born on this day in 4004 BC, within a quarter of an hour of 9 in the morning. This was supposedly because God liked to get things over with early.

Click on this LINK to see original Wikipedia list with many having links with details.

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About Me

Life long Liberal. Actually saw JFK on campaign trail. Defining moment of my life was the assassination of JFK. First presidential election I participated in was knocking on doors for McGovern, have been tilting at windmills ever since.